Mellencamp Knows Rock, Even Without Some Lyrics

John Mellencamp began the latest phase of his career by dumping the Cougar nickname forever and introducing nine new songs live onstage at Carnegie Hall.

It was, by most accounts, an impressive, rocking show that played up the qualities of "Whenever We Wanted," his first album in a couple of years and his first return to pure rock in nearly five.

In Hartford Sunday, on his second week of his full arena tour for "Whenever We Wanted," Mellencamp has decided to play it safe.

Although he and his band are performing a generous show -- with two hourlong sets, nearly two dozen songs, no opening band and an intermission -- there was room for just three of the new songs -- and not even the current single, "Again Tonight."

Not that there was a lot of filler in the show at the nearly sold out Hartford Civic Center. Face it, the guy has a career's worth of hits to fit in, dating back only a decade -- as far as his breakthrough "American Fool" album -- and continuing through to four tracks from "Big Daddy," the glum, largely acoustic 1989 album he chose not to promote with a tour.

The guts of the show are the Top 40 hits, which never seemed to stop, from "Jack & Diane" (met with a huge singalong), to "Lonely Ol' Night," "Small Town," "Crumblin' Down," "R.O.C.K. in the U.S.A.," "Play Guitar" and on and on.

Most were built on time-honored Stones riffs from an avowed lover of '60s garage rock, and the best of them had lyrics that kicked as well. The contemplative "Check It Out" and winsome "Minutes to Memories" come to mind. And all were done, with essentially his same touring band (plus a new guitarist, David Grissom) in essentially his same arrangements, save for a violin solo on "Small Town" here, or an intriguing hip hop beginning to the opening "Love and Happiness."

Cougar at 40 is a down-home, humble and, as he said more than once on stage, "the luckiest guy on earth." And he seemed happy to be skipping around the stage singing the hits even if he forgot the lyrics now and again. He lapsed into speech-making only at the beginning of "Rain on the Scarecrow" in announcing Farm Aid V. And his only hint at his hobby in painting came in the huge backdrop in the style of Georges Rouault.

But if he's got his heart in his new songs, he's got to sing them with the oldies as well. And he has to try different approaches, such as the acoustic rendition of "Big Daddy of Them All" and "Jackie Brown," which closed the first set.

Still, by the end's whirlwind wallop of "Hurt So Good," "Authority Song" and "Pink Houses," he had eliminated all arguments. And the single encore of "Cherry Bomb" was just bliss.

The song list for John Mellencamp was Love and Happiness, Paper in Fire, Jack & Diane, Lonely Ol' Night, Check It Out, Rain on the Scarecrow, Martha Say, The Real Life, Rumbleseat, Get a Leg Up, Big Daddy of Them All, Jackie Brown, (Second set) Small Town, Minutes to Memories, Now More Than Ever, Pop Singer, Crumblin' Down, R.O.C.K. in the U.S.A., Play Guitar, Hurt So Good, Authority Song, Pink Houses, (encore) Cherry Bomb